Who's Who and What's That

Variation of the Ghostbusters Logo based on the operning of 'The Real Ghostbusters'

Design by That's Art Folk

The book 'Who's Who and What's That' - an up-to-date copy of which is located in the Ghostbusters Firehouse Library; specifically in the second bookcase, third shelf, dead center - is a resource for the occult and paranormal community that is more accessible to the layman than the rarer and more obscure Spate's Catalog or Tobin's Spirit Guide. 

The tome serves as a highly useful reference to those interested in identifying the wide variety of spectral entities and supernatural miscreants one can encounter in the defense of our world from theirs. With Halloween approaching, it is very likely your Ghostbusters franchise is about to get really busy. The information in this book should be be quite helpful, so we here at The Home Office would like to point to a few key entries that our research tells us are likely to pop up...

It has been established in our own Ghostbusters canon that the weeks leading up to Halloween get busier and busier, often culminating in a major incident around October 31st. While you never know what might manifest during this time, there are certain beings more likely to appear than others. 

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Note that Who's Who and What's That introduces some additional and alternative Descriptors applicable to the Ghostbusters CDI System.

Conditional: A wide ranging Descriptor that covers any entities who manifest when a specific condition is met. The criteria can be nearly anything, from 'Appears in the evening of the first day of Autumn, usually at sundown, every year', to 'Whenever someone says the ghost's name three times'. Sometimes referred to as Triggered, this Descriptor can be seen in the description of The Fall Bearer (aka The Ghost of Rottinghume Manor), as well as below. 

Paired: Most PKE Manifestations appear singularly, one being appearing by itself. On occasion, multiple ghosts will appear simultaneously or come into being separately and then gather together. In specific instances, there will be ghosts that only appear in a group; none of the individuals can or do appear without the others. This type of manifestion receives the Descriptor Grouped. A less common but notable variation of this is Paired; when two entities appear together and only together. Paired Ghosts have a connection with each other that makes tougher to deal with in unison. Remember the Scoleri Brothers? They're a perfect example of Paired paranormal beings.

Tempered: Rare Descriptor indicating a spectral being who places a self-imposed limit on the nature or amount of damage and chaos it causes. This sort of entity will only create mayhem up to the point of its own choosing. 

Examples of this would be a ghost who tries to terrify everyone except small children, whom it shows kindness towards, or one that screams and throws things so long as no one is looking at it.

Sometimes the criteria it has set for itself is subtle or at least not especially obvious at first (such as Sweet Tooth - see below).

These beings should not be confused with those who deserve the Descriptor Constrained or [less commonly] Restricted. These ghosts are limited by some being or condition outside themselves. 

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The Halloween Hater

AKA: The Ghost of the Grand Market Mall T-Mart, Foresaken Clerk

CDI: Focused, Conditional Repeating Phantom or a Class IV Full-Roaming Fog.

The Halloween Hater is a ghost with a grudge against the holiday and her goal is to take the fun out of the spooky season every year it comes around. In life it is believed she was a Puritan Woman by the name of Foresaken Clerk (an earlier version of the name Clarke, generally referring to a scribe). She was critical of her Irish and Scottish neighbors, specifically angered by their annual All Hallow's Eve celebrations. Each year she would dress up in festivity appropriate garb and sabotage the holiday activities. She was finally caught by a young Irish girl who pointed out Foresaken was participating by pulling 'tricks' on her kinfolk, all while in disguise. Flustered and infuriated, Foresaken ran back home but accidentally fell in a ditch, hit her head on a rock, and died. 

Fast forward to modern times and the popular discount department store T-Mart, taking up a large portion of the Grand Market Mall, is haunted by Foresaken's ghost, which appears every year as soon as Halloween themed candy and costumes go on sale. Her main goal is to either damage the display and merchandise or frighten away customers. Things have escalated in the last two years as a new manager thought of using Foresaken's presence as a means of bringing people in to the store. 'Don't be a Halloween Hater!', say signs showing an illustration of Foresaken, 'Come to T-Mart, your one-stop Scary Fun Shop!'.

Foresaken is not amused.

The Halloween Hater appears as a full-torso apparition that looks like a Puritan Woman in her early 20s. She wears clothing typical of New England Puritan women of the late 16th or early 17th century. The ghost has no clear feet, as is typical of full-torso entities, and instead 'ends' in a dimly glowing fog. Her head covering hides the exact spot where Foresaken's skull collided with the stone that did her in. The horrible wound beneath is visible when Foresaken uses her Frightening Visage ability. One important detail is that she appears with a journal or diary of some kind, one which she will do anything to protect. The Halloween Hater will not let anyone touch this book, whatever it is. 

In addition to transitioning into a Terrifying Visage and being able to Physically Push things, Foresaken has a rather limited but strangely effective psychokinetic ability, Psychokinetic Trip. This causes anyone targeted to trip over nothing and fall prone if the Halloween Hater gets more Successes than the person's Athletics Attribute. Note, this is not 'if she gets more Successes than the target does when they make an Athletics roll'. This is more Successes than the target's stat. For example: If she tries to trip Professor Gabriel Zimmerman, she needs to roll 3 or more Successes, as his Athletics stat is 3. He does not get an Athletics Defense Roll as the attack is invisible and essentially comes from nowhere.

Now, if he knew an attack was coming and he decided to run, Foresaken would have to get 6 or more Successes as Zimmerman has the Signature Skill 'Run' at 6 Dice and that would be an appropriate defense. Again, not a Defense Roll but a better chance of avoiding the attack and its effects. It's less about distance and more about Foresaken being able to concentrate on a clear target. 

Scenario Idea: A local female celebrity of some kind (influencer, musican, politican)  comes into the T-Mart to buy some Halloween stuff for herself and maybe some friends or her kids. The Halloween Hater goes crazy! Foresaken keeps tripping the woman and anyone she's with, frightening them and pushing displays on top of them. Turns out the woman is a descendant of the Irish girl who pointed out Foresaken's hypocrisy almost 200 years ago. 

Sweet Tooth

AKA: The Candy Counter Ghost

CDI: Focused, Tempered, Non-Terminal Repeating Phantasm or a Class V Free-Roaming Vapor

First appearing in Brooklyn, NY around the end of the 19th Century, the 'Candy Counter Ghost', later dubbed 'Sweet Tooth', became the bane of the numerous immigrant candy makers who established New York as the [now unsung] capital of the candy world. As more and more confectioners came to New York City and set up shop, the menace of the gluttonous Sweet Tooth ghost grew greater and greater.

This Phantasm traditionally appears and wrecks havoc in candy stores or sweets factories, eating everything in sight from jujyfruits to junior mints, then suddenly stopping and disappearing once again. This has been its pattern for decades.

A few renowned occultists in the late 30s surmised that this particular Vapor ate as much as it liked but never so much as to completely eliminate its food source. That is to say, it never consumes so much candy that any of the confection crafters is preys on are forced to go out of business. Still, it haa hurt the livelihoods of a great many people and continues to do so whenever it reappears.

Personally, I would lean into this and have the entity wrestle with the paradox; it loves candy and will consume all it can but not too much 'cause then there won't be any candy and the candy makers will go away. At the same time, there is sooo much candy! Why not eat it all! Oh wait... It's enough to drive a Reoccurring Phantasm mad! 

Many of Sweet Tooth's appearances across the past 100+ years have been random, however it's guaranteed to show up during candy focused holidays such as Christmas, Easter, and especially Halloween.

The Candy Counter Ghost resembles a typical Class V Vapor upon first manifesting; the entity is off-white in color and appears to be made of soft chewing gum, taffy, or stale marshmallow. As Sweet Tooth consumes candy he begins to take on blotches of color as if stained by the lollipops and gumdrops he's eaten. Sweet Tooth also gradually increases in size during its treat consumption rampage.

Another side effect, and one that relates to Sweet Tooth's only unique supernatural ability, is that its Ectoplasmic Residue becomes thicker than average, turns pink and/or lime green, and extremely sticky. The Phantasm uses this syrupy slime to hinder or trap pursuers. In addition to passing through things and leaving Ectoplasm behind, Sweet Tooth is able to project it forward, downward, or backwards out from its lower torso. (Opponents Slimed are at a -1D penalty to all rolls for one round per Sweet Tooth's Successes using Extra Sticky Slime in addition to normal Slime rules). 

While Sweet Tooth always appears during Candy-centric holidays, it isn't considered 'Conditional' because it appears randomly at other times as well. 

Scenario Idea: A posh new Candy Pop-Up Shop opens and its taking a lot of customers and money away from a veteran, Mom-and-Pop confectioner whose been around since the early 20th century. The latter finds an incantation in an old book that enables them to summon Sweet Tooth and sick'em on the competition.

Trick and Treat

AKA: The Terrible Trick or Treat Twins

CDI: Paired Non-Terminal Repeating Spectres or Class Vs Free-Roaming Masses

These two peculiar paranormal perps were difficult to classify but were eventually given the designation of Class Vs (Class Five-'S') They seem to manifest as sentient, mobile Halloween costumes, usually simple bedsheet ghosts, roughly the size of middle school children. They possess a faint green glow (like glow-in-the-dark' toys from the 80s) that is much more easily seen at night (like glow-in-the-dark toys from the 80s). Note that they have feet and wear rubber soled boots or perhaps high-top sneakers. In addition to their costumes and footwear, the 'Twins' (as they are often called) carry plastic Jack O' Lanterns often filled with candy. Note that these are real, not Ectoplasmic, though everything else about them is. 

The exact origin of these two entities is a mystery. They first started to appear in urban and suburban areas along the Eastern Coast of the United States during the mid-to-late 1930s. They disappeared following the Great Depression, with no known reports of them again until well after World War II. Since the early 1970s they appear in a far wider range of geographic areas, though exclusively within the continental USA. 

When the Sun begins to set on the night of October 31s, these two ghosts will appear amid all the other local trick or treaters and try to blend in with the crowds. They will never go more than a few feet from each other, tend to lag behind largely groups, and rarely speak or interact with anyone durings these times. When they do their voices sound like raspy male children around 12 years of age. They keep their sentences short and use a limited vocabulary. 

Trick and Treat's M.O. is to wait under there is no one else in front of a house or apartment and then knock on the door saying, 'Trick or Treat' in unison. If they are given candy, they give the person a nod or slight bow before leaving to the next house. On occasion, Treat has even been known to say thank you.

If they are given anything else...fruit, money, chapstick..they will stand in front of the person for an awkwardly long moment in complete silence before slowly walking off. Trick will then egg the house, throw toilet paper all over it, or some other suitably childish 'revenge'. Now, if they are given nothing, the consequences can be much more severe. Trick has been known to let all the air out of someone's tired, stick rocks up their tailpipe, leave flaming ectoplasm poop on the person's doorstep, and in one instance 'he' dropped fireworks down their chimney into an active fireplace.

The response is also effected by how the person in the home is perceived. If they give nothing but explain they are poor, retired and can't easily get to the store, or some other reasonable excuse, Trick is much more lenient. If the person in the house is nasty to the pair in any way, Trick's actions will scale up accordingly. 

On some occasions, Treat will feel bad for someone who has very little but gives the pair some sort of candy, even if its a single chocolate kiss or life-saver. When this happens, he will leave them candy! Usually it is a lollipop or candy bar. 

Both Trick and Treat have the ability to Manifest Objects from seemingly nowhere and can Physically Move things roughly equivalent to what the average adult Human can lift and move. 

Scenario Idea: Trick and Treat enter an area where no one seems to be home. Trick wants to wreck havoc, Treat wants him to wait. Finally they discover a Halloween Party for the neighborhood kids and their families being thrown at your Ghostbusters HQ. The Twins will knock and if invited in, they'll participate in the fun a little before disappearing and leaving behind a bunch of candy. If barred from entering, scrutinized, or otherwise made to feel unwelcome, Trick will cause all manner of chaos - up to and including shutting down the Power Grid!

That's all for now. Remember Ghostbusters, Another Ghost, Another Dollar.

Who ya gonna call?

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